


After the storm

by anamia



Category: Les Misérables - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Historical, F/F, la belle époque
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-05-19
Updated: 2013-05-18
Packaged: 2017-12-12 06:49:00
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,133
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/808547
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/anamia/pseuds/anamia
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After the Surprise, Fantine goes home to mourn the loss of her love, Favourite seeks out her poet with lightness in her heart, and Dahlia and Zéphine make do quite without the help of men at all.</p>
<p>Set in Paris, circa 1900.</p>
            </blockquote>





	After the storm

**Author's Note:**

> This was written for the Les Mis Across History ficfest, which is great and everyone should go check it out. I'm just going to come out and confess that I pretty much approach research on an 'as needed' basis, so if there are things that I failed to include or got terribly wrong I do apologize. This is officially chaptered, but it's more a series of vignettes than anything else.

After Favourite read out the letter, signed by all four young men though written in Tholomyès’ hand, Zéphine felt as though a great weight had been lifted from her chest. She laughed with the others, letting out her mirth in a cascade of merriment. Beside her Dahlia too laughed, the long laugh of a woman freed at last from a terrible burden. Beneath the table they shared Dahlia’s hand found Zéphine’s and did not let go until at last it came time to leave the Cabaret Bombarda. Neither noticed how Fantine, poor sensitive Fantine with her large blue eyes and timid manner, struggled to cover her sorrow with gaiety, nor would they have spared more than a moment’s pity for her if they had. Their thoughts were only for each other. Favourite, in that way she always had, guessed their preoccupation easily enough and she gifted them with a knowing smirk before sauntering out the door, no doubt to find her poet and impart the happy news.

“I should have guessed,” Zéphine remarked as they returned to the rooms they shared, arm in arm as was their custom. “He gave me nearly 1000 francs the day before yesterday.”

Dahlia’s eyes grew round at the extravagant sum, and she giggled. “Would that Listolier had shown the same foresight,” she said. “I find myself quite envious all of a sudden, though I would not have wanted to flatter Fameuil in order to come by such riches.”

“And yet you made eyes at your Listolier without a second thought,” Zéphine returned, though there was nothing but fondness in her tone. “It is only bad luck that he turned out to be parsimonious as well as boorish at the table.”

“Not so parsimonious as all that,” Dahlia corrected. They turned off the main boulevard and into the side street which contained their rooms. “But with an odd aversion to showing his appreciation in the form of cash.” She gave a little half shrug, as though to say ‘ah well, one cannot have everything.’

They reached the stoop of their building and pushed open the door, stepping into the poorly lit foyer with a soft rustle of skirts. The hour was not so late that everyone else slept, but they passed no one as they climbed the stairs to the second floor. Dahlia unlocked the door, using the key that hung on a thin ribbon around her neck. She yawned.

“Having been woken at such an unseemly hour this morning I find myself quite exhausted,” she declared. “I believe I shall retire early tonight.”

Zéphine nodded her agreement, smothering a yawn of her own behind one hand.

“Will you unlace me?” Dahlia asked even as she stooped to light a candle to take into the bedroom.

“Certainly,” Zéphine said. “If you will return the favor.”

The two crossed into their shared bedroom, navigating the layout of the rooms easily despite the darkness outside. A slight glimmer of light came in through the window from the streetlights below, just enough for the furniture to cast long shadows that played tricks on the perception. Neither were fooled and they arrived at the bed without incident.

It was a matter of minutes to unbutton Dahlia’s dress and loosen her corset. Zéphine’s garments, more intricate than her friend’s, took slightly longer, but soon both stood in their underthings, dresses hung away neatly. Zéphine perched on one side of the bed, carefully taking down the elegant mass of hair in order to send the heavy waves of black hair to tumblr down her back. When she had set the last pin aside she reached for her brush, but Dahlia beat her to it.

“Let me,” she said, and Zéphine relented, allowing her friend to run the brush through her locks in long, careful strokes. Zéphine’s eyes fluttered shut under Dahlia’s ministrations and she let out a soft sigh of contentment. Behind her, Dahlia laughed softly, shifting so that her knees brushed the small of Zéphine’s back, not hard enough to hurt but still solidly there.

Dahlia took her time, running her hands as well as the brush through Zéphine’s hair, nearly as thick as Fantine’s and twice as glossy. At last Dahlia set the brush aside and plaited the slightly coarse strands efficiently, trying them off and tossing the braid over one of Zéphine’s shoulders. She leaned over and pressed a light kiss on the other. “Your turn,” she murmured into the hollow of Zéphine’s collarbone.

Zéphine grumbled slightly at being forced to move, but she swapped places with Dahlia and deftly removed the pins from her friend’s light brown curls. Dahlia let out a low noise of pleasure as the pressure on her scalp was relieved and Zéphine laughed.

“You needn’t pin it _quite_ so tightly,” she chided. “It will not escape.”

“But imagine if it did!” Dahlia protested. “I could not bear to have unruly pieces of hair escape from beneath my hat. Better to endure some pain than to suffer such indignity.”

Zéphine, who had endured her fair share of minor inconveniences for the sake of her vanity, did not reply. A comfortable silence fell over the room as Zéphine worked the brush through Dahlia’s hair and tamed the unruly locks. At last she too finished and sat back, returning the brush to its place on the small vanity cabinet and reclaiming her place on the bed. She encircled her arms around Dahlia’s shoulders, pulling the other back a little to rest in her embrace.

“I have missed you,” she murmured into Dahlia’s hair.

“I’ve been right here,” Dahlia protested, though she did not pull away.

“It’s not the same and you know it well,” Zéphine returned in a tone that might have been arch had she not been drowsy with fatigue and contentment. “We both had other entanglements.”

Dahlia made a noise of agreement in the back of her throat. “And now we are free women,” she said, and turned her head, finding and claiming Zéphine’s mouth with her own.

After a few moments she pulled away and one hand came up to massage her neck. “Perhaps a more comfortable position,” she suggested. “And we can do it properly.”

Zéphine laughed and let her go, only to scoot back and pull Dahlia down with her, eliciting a squeak of surprise from this last. “How can I say no to such a splendid proposition?” she asked, dark eyes dancing mischievously, displaying a side to her character that none but Dahlia were permitted to see. Certainly Fameuil, had he been in the room, would have been shocked to see such a thing from his meek and gentle lover. He was, however, long gone and quite forgotten just like his friends and his former mistress had quite other things on her mind.


End file.
